Matt wrote a similar letter, but one more heartfelt, to the sad king.
The sad king was not ill at all. When leaving his country in secret to see Matt, he had ordered his doctor to say he was ill and to allow no one into his bedroom.
Every morning, the doctor would go into the empty bedroom and pretend to examine the king. Then he would bring in all sorts of medicine and food; the medicine he poured down the sink, the food he ate himself.
But when the sad king finally returned from his journey and was really back in his bed, he looked so exhausted that everyone believed he’d been ill. Because it’s hard traveling in a country where there’s a war on, especially if you have to conceal your identity.
As soon as the sad king went to his office and read both letters, he said: “Prepare the royal train for me. I am going to see the king who is the friend of the Oriental kings.”
The sad king hoped he could persuade the other king to ally himself with Matt, but he didn’t know what a cunning trick the spy had up his sleeve.
“OH, SO MATT didn’t do you any harm!” said the spy, hissing with fury as he left the king who was the friend of the Oriental kings. “I have three days. I have to do something to make him angry at Matt. Then he’ll sing a different tune.” In his pocket the spy had a document with Felek’s signature and a forgery of Matt’s. This document was supposed to be a manifesto addressed to all the children of the world.
Children!
I, Matt the First, appeal for your help in carrying out my reforms. I want a world where children won’t have to obey the grownups, where they can do whatever they feel like. We’re always hearing “You can’t do this, that’s not nice, that’s not polite.” It’s not fair. Why can grownups do everything and we can’t do anything? They’re always mad at us and yelling at us and punishing us. They even hit us. I want children to have the same rights as grownups. I am a king and I know history well. In the old days, peasants, workers, women, and blacks had no rights. Now they all have rights. The children are the only ones with none!
I have already given the children in my country their rights. The children in Queen Campanelli’s country have begun an uprising. Start your own revolution and demand your rights. If your kings don’t agree, overthrow them and elect me your king. I want to be the king of all the children in the world—white, yellow, and black. I will give you freedom. So help me make my world revolution!
Signed,
King Matt
Minister Baron von Rauch
The journalist went to a printer and paid him to print up thousands of copies of the manifesto and to hand them out all over the city. He smeared a few copies with mud, then dried them off, crumpled them up, and put them in his pocket.
The two kings were conferring, and had just about decided to join with Matt, when in walked the journalist to say: “Look what Matt’s up to. He’s inciting the children to revolt, he wants to become king of the world. Here are three leaflets I found on the street. I’m sorry they’re a bit dirty.”
The two kings read the leaflets and grew very concerned.
“There’s no choice. We have to side against Matt. Now he’s interfering with our children. They’re not his subjects, and neither are the Oriental children. That’s very bad.”
The sad king had tears in his eyes.
What has Matt gone and done now? he thought. Why did he write that manifesto?
But there was no way out of it.
Maybe it will even be better for Matt if I declare war on him, too, thought the sad king. As things stand now, they won’t show him any pity when they win, and maybe I could be of some help to Matt afterwards.
At first, Matt refused to believe that the other two kings were advancing on him, too.
So, he thought, even the sad king has betrayed me. Well, that’s how it goes. In the last war, I showed them Matt in victory, and this time I’ll show them Matt in death.
The entire city went out with shovels and began to dig trenches and build ramparts. They dug three lines of trenches—one fifteen miles from the city, one ten, and one five.
“We will withdraw step by step.”
When the young king learned that the two other armies were on their way with help, he began the battle himself, because he wanted to be the first to set foot in the capital. He was counting on a quick victory and took the first line of trenches without much trouble. But the second line of defense was stronger, the ramparts higher, the trenches wider, and the barbed wire thicker.
It was then that the other two armies arrived. And now it was three armies that struck at Matt’s men.
The battle lasted the entire day. The enemy suffered heavy losses, and Matt was still holding tight.
“Maybe we should make peace?” said the sad king hesitantly, but the others attacked him at once.
“No, we have to teach that brat a lesson.”
And once again, the battle raged from morning on.
“Aha, they’re shooting less now,” said the enemy happily.
And indeed Matt’s troops were firing fewer rounds that day, because they had received orders not to waste a single bullet.
“What now?” asked Matt.
“I think,” said the Prime Minister, “that we have to try to sue for peace again. How can we fight a war without ammunition?”
As the leader of the African detachment, Klu Klu was also at the military council. Her detachment had not been in the battle yet, because it had no weapons. The African children only knew how to use bows and arrows. At first, they couldn’t find the right kind of wood for making their bows and arrows. Then they finally did, but still had to make everything from scratch. Now everything was ready.
“Here’s my advice,” said Klu Klu. “Withdraw tonight to the third line of defense. Meanwhile, send someone over to the enemy camp to say that Bum Drum has sent Matt soldiers and wild animals. Tomorrow morning, we’ll let the lions and tigers out of their cages and shoot arrows at the enemy. That’ll give them a good scare, and then we can talk about making peace.”
“But wouldn’t that be cheating?” asked Matt worriedly.
“No, that’s called military strategy,” said the Minister of Justice.
Everyone agreed to Klu Klu’s plan.
Felek disguised himself as an enemy soldier and crawled to the enemy camp on his belly. Once inside, he began talking with some soldiers and casually mentioned the lions and Bum Drum’s soldiers.
But they didn’t believe a word of it and laughed at him. “You dope, you must have dreamed it.”
But still, those soldiers repeated the story.
Later, Felek was stopped by a soldier who said: “You heard the news?”
“No, what?” asked Felek.
“Bum Drum’s sent soldiers and lions to help Matt.”
“Nonsense,” said Felek.
“No, it’s not. You can hear the wild animals roaring.”
“Let them roar, what do I care,” said Felek.
“You’ll care when a lion’s tearing you to pieces.”
“I’m not scared of any lion.”
“What a bigmouth! You against a lion. Look at you—you don’t even look like a real soldier.”
Felek walked to another part of the camp. There the soldiers were saying that Bum Drum had sent Matt an entire ship full of poisonous snakes. Now Felek no longer said anything but just listened or laughed in disbelief. But the soldiers shouted at him, told him not to laugh, and said that he’d be better off praying before his stupid laughter got him into trouble.
The soldiers had fallen for it!
After a few days in battle, the soldiers had grown tired and edgy. They were far from home and had been told that it would be an easy battle, that Matt had no gunpowder and wouldn’t put up any defense, but they had seen that it wasn’t going to be so easy. And now they were so tired, lonely, and angry that they’d believe any nonsense.
Felek crawled back and told Matt how well Klu Klu’s idea was working. Matt could feel new c
ourage rising in him. “I’ve been lucky before, maybe I’ll be lucky this time, too.”
That night, Matt’s soldiers left their trenches without making a sound and moved closer to the city. The soldiers brought up the cages with the lions and tigers. Five hundred of the African children stayed near the cages. The other five hundred spread out among the other units in groups of ten so the enemy would see them everywhere.
This was the plan: The next morning, the enemy would see that their fire wasn’t being returned and rush to attack. They would find the trenches empty. They’d start rejoicing and cheering. The capital was close by and soon they’d be looting, eating, drinking, and carousing. Then suddenly the Africans would start beating their drums and howling; they’d let the wild animals loose and shoot arrows at their heels to drive them toward the enemy. Panic, disorder, confusion. Then Matt would lead his cavalry into the attack, followed by the infantry.
It would be a terrible battle, but that would only help teach them a lesson once and for all.
“It has to work. A person who’s taken by surprise when he’s feeling good gets the daylights scared out of him.”
Two other things: Matt’s soldiers left plenty of vodka, beer, and wine in the trenches. And hay, paper, and wood were piled by the cages to be set on fire and enrage the animals when the doors were opened.
This would also keep the lions from attacking Matt’s own men.
Some people even thought a few snakes should be let out.
“Better forget the snakes,” said Klu Klu. “They’re very moody and finicky. But you can count on the lions.”
BUT THE ENEMY had a plan, too.
“Listen,” said the young king. “We have to be in Matt’s capital tomorrow. Otherwise, we might be in trouble. We’re far from home. We have to ship all our supplies in by train, but Matt’s at home. It’s easier to fight outside a city that’s yours, where everything’s right at hand. But civilians panic easily. And our job is to help make them even more panicky. Tomorrow morning, our airplanes will start bombing the city, and the civilians will force Matt to surrender. We must make it impossible for our troops to withdraw. We’ll position machine guns in the rear, and if they try to retreat, we’ll open fire on them.”
“What, open fire on our own troops?”
“We have to be in Matt’s capital tomorrow, or I’m in trouble,” repeated the young king. “And any soldier who tries to flee the battlefield is our enemy and not one of us.”
The soldiers were informed that the general attack and final battle would come tomorrow.
“There are three of us, and Matt’s all alone,” read the order of the day. “Matt is low on cannons and powder. There’s a revolution in his capital. His soldiers don’t want to fight any more. They’re hungry and worn out. Tomorrow we occupy Matt’s capital and take him prisoner.”
The planes were fueled up and loaded with bombs for their takeoff at dawn.
Machine guns were positioned behind the troops.
“What for?” asked the soldiers.
“Machine guns are for defense, not for attack,” said the officers.
Still, the soldiers didn’t like the idea.
No one slept that night, either in Matt’s camp or his enemies’.
Some soldiers cleaned their rifles, others wrote letters home, saying farewell to their loved ones.
There was total silence, except for the crackle of the campfires. But the soldiers could hear their hearts pounding all the louder in that silence.
Dawn.
The sky was still gray when the enemy cannons began firing at Matt’s empty trenches. Each time a big gun went off, Matt’s soldiers laughed.
“Waste your ammo and waste it good,” said the soldiers, laughing.
Matt stood on a rise, staring at the battlefield through binoculars.
“Here they come!”
Some of the enemy soldiers were running, some crawling cautiously. They kept pouring out of their trenches, first fearful, then braver. Some of them were encouraged by the silence in Matt’s trenches, but others found it disturbing.
Suddenly, twenty airplanes rose into the sky, heading straight for Matt’s capital. Unfortunately, Matt had only five planes. The children liked the airplanes best of all, which meant that they had ruined nearly all of them.
A furious air battle began. The enemy lost six planes, and all Matt’s planes either were shot down or had to make forced landings.
The battle had begun as predicted.
The enemy occupied the first lines of defense with cries of triumph. “Aha, they ran away. They were scared. They have no cannons. They ran away in such a hurry they didn’t even have time to take their vodka with them.”
Some of the soldiers began uncorking the flasks. “Let’s give it a try.”
They drank the vodka, started enjoying themselves, and were ready to call it a day.
“What’s the big rush? This is a good place.”
But the young king repeated stubbornly: “We must be in Matt’s capital today.”
The cannons and machine guns were brought up.
“Attack!”
The soldiers were a little tipsy, and reluctant to attack. But orders were orders. Might as well get it over with. So they went out into the open and charged Matt’s last line of defense.
Then suddenly the cannons roared, the machine guns began chattering. Bullets and—strangest of all—arrows began raining down on them.
Suddenly, a savage cry arose from Matt’s camp, followed by the sound of fifes and drums.
And then suddenly they saw African soldiers in the trenches. They looked small, but maybe that was because they were still pretty far away. There weren’t many of them, but the enemy soldiers were seeing double and their ears were ringing.
Then lions and tigers, infuriated by the shooting and the fires, began bounding straight at the attacking enemy. Strange as it may seem, it’s more frightening to see one man torn apart by a lion than a hundred killed by bullets. As if a lion’s claws were worse than a steel bullet.
Now there was utter confusion. Some soldiers flung their rifles to the ground and ran like madmen right into the barbed wire. Others turned and ran and were fired on by their own machine guns. And thinking they were caught in cross fire, they either fell to the ground or raised their arms to surrender.
The enemy cavalry, which was to support the attack, now came full force at the riflemen, trampling and wounding them.
Smoke, dust, chaos. No one could see anything any more, no one had any idea what was happening. It went on like that for an hour, then another hour.
Later, when historians described this battle, they each wrote a different version of the events, but they all agreed that there’d never been anything like it before.
“Oh,” said the Minister of War, almost in tears, “if only we had enough ammunition for another two hours!”
But they didn’t, and that was that.
“Cavalry, charge!” cried Matt, leaping onto his beautiful white horse.
They had one last hope—to take advantage of the panic, charge the enemy and seize his supplies, then drive him away from the city before he learned that Bum Drum had not come to Matt’s aid and that a few African children and two dozen wild animals from the zoo had brought Matt the victory.
No sooner had Matt mounted his horse than he glanced back at the city—and was stunned.
No, it couldn’t be. It was some terrible mistake. He must be seeing things.
But, unfortunately, he wasn’t.
White flags were fluttering from all the city’s towers. The capital was surrendering.
Messengers were already speeding to the city with orders to tear down those white rags and shoot all cowards and traitors. But, unfortunately, it was too late.
The enemy had already spotted those symbols of disgrace and surrender. At first, the enemy soldiers were dumbfounded, but that didn’t last long.
In battle, a single glass of vodka can make a soldier dru
nk, but it only takes one bullet whistling by his head to sober him up.
In battle, fear can change to hope in an instant, despair to fury.
The enemy soldiers rubbed their eyes. Were they dreaming or awake? Matt’s cannons were silent, the ground was littered with bullet-riddled lions and tigers. And the white flags meant that the city was surrendering.
The young king understood what had happened and cried: “Charge!”
First the officers, then the soldiers caught up the cry.
Matt saw what was happening, but there was nothing he could do now.
The enemy was forming ranks and picking up the rifles that had been flung aside. The white flags were disappearing, but it was too late now.
The enemy advanced and reached the barbed wire, which they began cutting with clippers.
“Your Royal Highness,” said an old general, his voice trembling.
Matt knew what he was about to say. Matt jumped down from his horse and, pale as a ghost, shouted: “Follow me to die with honor!”
There weren’t many people willing to follow Matt, just Felek, Antek, Klu Klu, and a few dozen soldiers.
“Where are we going?” they asked.
“The lion house. It’s empty now, and solid. We’ll defend ourselves there like lions, like kings.”
“There won’t be room for everyone there.”
“All the better,” whispered Matt.
There were five cars nearby. They got in, grabbing whatever weapons and ammunition they could find.
After they had pulled away, Matt glanced back, and saw a white flag flying over his camp.
Matt felt that fate was mocking him: he had ordered those banners of shame and surrender torn down in his capital. But now it wasn’t the old people, the women and children, terrified by a few dozen bombs, but his army which had thrown itself on the enemy’s mercy.
“It’s a good thing I’m not there with them now,” said Matt. “Don’t cry, Klu Klu, we’ll die a beautiful death. And then people will stop saying that kings only declare wars but don’t die fighting like soldiers.”
King Matt the First Page 26
